too, trying to figure out exactly what he
meant. No-sound? What is the sound of
no-sound? Did he mean the absence of
the gong’s sound, or the memory of it,
or was there some experience he wanted
me to have? Gonnnngggg...God knows, I
tried to hear it, the no-sound. The gong
would fade and fade and fade until it was
just a faintly crackling vibration. Some-
times my attention would be right there
when the last note dropped out, but...so
what? The sound was there; then it wasn’t.
I just didn’t get it.
That was seventeen years ago. The
room where we meditated—to me it was a
beloved and sacred room—was the office
where Ed conducted his psychotherapy
practice in Pasadena, California. To get to
his office from the sidewalk, you’d push
through a vine-covered gate that creaked,
then walk past a small patch of roses
and a cool, moss-covered wall until you
reached the side door. It got so that just
going through that creaking gate signaled
a change in consciousness. It signaled the
opportunity to spend an hour or two in
the company of a remarkable man. Funny,
he might have appeared to all the world as
just another sixty-year-old white male, but
if you paid attention you would have seen
that his countenance shone with wisdom
and compassion. His features seemed de-
signed for that very purpose.
“Sounds come into existence, stay vary-
ing lengths of time, and then vanish...as
does all experience.” I heard Ed say this
countless times. Gradually, as I became a
Buddhist, I realized that he was giving us
a gentle lesson in impermanence: every-
thing has its life in time, then vanishes.
The room vanished first. Ed’s wife,
Melinda, developed Alzheimer’s at the
GONNGGGG...My late Zen teacher, Dr.
Edward Wortz, had a wonderful iron
bowl. Of all the meditation bowls I’ve ever
heard, it made the sweetest, purest sound
as Ed struck it to begin and end our medi-
tation periods. That sound, accompanied
by the fragrance of incense settling in the
room, took the hard edges off the day, in-
viting you to be present. After striking it,
Ed might offer a few words of guidance
to start off the period, his voice, like the
bell, warm and calm. It reassured you that
there really was a way out of suffering,
a path of wisdom and compassion. And
then, as day gradually turned to night, the
birds still singing, children playing under
the trees, the cool evening air coming in
through the open windows, we began our
listening meditation.
The initial instructions for the listening
meditation were simple: sit still, relaxed
and alert, and listen to whatever sounds
appear in your environment. Listen with
“bare attention”; that is, without adding
any thoughts, labels, or judgments to the
sounds. Listen, in Ed’s words, as “sounds
come into existence, stay for varying
lengths of time, and then vanish...as does
all experience.”
Sometimes Ed used the bowl to illus-
trate later stages of the practice. As we sat
there with our eyes closed, he would strike
the bell and say, “Listen to this sound [the
bowl went GONNGGGG] exactly here. Now
listen as it decays [gonngggg].” After several
moments the gonngggg would finally dis-
appear, replaced by the birds, or crickets, or
a car passing by. Ed would say, “Now, listen!
Exactly where the sound was—listen to the
no-sound.”
My ears would strain, reaching for
the no-sound. My brain would strain,
Bell South
With a strike of the gong, sound is born, sustains, and passes away. All things are like this, notes ERIK HANSEN, but where
is the no-sound his Zen teacher talked about? Is it the sound of one hand clapping? Is it the jackhammer in the street?
ILLUSTRATIONSBYTONYMATTHEWS
SHAMBHALA SUN SEPTEMBER 2006 35